by Paul Doherty
A hoopoe bird swooped low over the canal in a flash of colour. In a thicket beside us a hare suddenly coursed out, making me start.
‘That’s Horemheb’s idea,’ Sobeck murmured. ‘He likes hares; the bloody palace now teems with them. Apparently his dwarfs have to chase them. I have been listening to the gossip: Horemheb keeps his wife under lock and key.’
I recalled Mutnojnet, Nefertiti’s unlikely sister, a quiet, comely-faced woman who seemed to worship the ground Horemheb stood on.
‘And?’
‘Well, not so much under lock and key,’ Sobeck retorted. ‘That’s unfair to the good general, but they are preparing for themselves the most exquisite tombs out in Sakkara. You must go and see them.’
‘Why are they interesting?’
‘Horemheb regards himself as if he was Pharaoh or his heir.’ Sobeck’s eyes were watchful. ‘According to the paintings ordered for his tomb and the inscriptions carved on the walls, you’d think he had spent most of his life saving Egypt from a myriad of enemies. What I am saying, Mahu, is that it gives you some insight into the man.’
‘The rest are no different,’ Djarka intervened. ‘Look at the tombs abandoned in the City of the Aten. What was it Maya wrote on his? “When I began I was very good, when I finished I was brilliant.” He’s still a young man. They will be trouble, won’t they?’
‘They’ll be trouble,’ I agreed, ‘but not yet. Everyone is watching everyone else, strengthening their position. Now Meryre and his gang have gone, the lines will be clearer. There will be no more talk about the Aten or returning to its city, or,’ I added drily, ‘the Shabtis of Akenhaten. How did Meryre escape?’
‘One day he was here,’ Djarka replied, ‘the next day he was gone. He was confined in Lord Nebamun’s house, close to the river. The guards were few. About three days after Lord Ay’s arrival here, Meryre and his retinue disappeared.’
‘Any news from Buhen?’
‘The same,’ Djarka replied. ‘It was becoming a gathering place for every refugee from the City of the Aten. Tutu was lording it over the garrison commander. The news of the great victory at Sile seeped out; Tutu and his entourage left, and haven’t been seen since.’
‘Where will they go?’ Sobeck asked.
‘Where can they go?’ I replied. ‘They are traitors, and priests or not, the Royal Circle will post rewards on their heads, dead or alive. The Red Lands will be scoured. They’ll be safest in Canaan or the Hittite territories, but we’ll see.’
Sobeck threw his last pebble into the canal and stretched out his hand. ‘I have done what I can; now I must go. I have business in Thebes, Mahu.’ He gave his crooked smile. ‘I am sure there will be those who think, out of sight out of mind.’
‘Sobeck, I haven’t thanked you …’
He clapped me on the shoulder. ‘Oh, don’t worry, Mahu, you will. I’ll make my farewells of Maya and leave.’
I felt sad as I watched him go, my comrade-in-arms. We had gone through the dangers in the Delta and Sobeck had played his part; now he wanted to return to the slums of Eastern Thebes and what he called his own private kingdom! Djarka and I returned to Colonel Nebamun’s house. The old soldier was delighted that we were his guests. I asked him to organise the mercenaries, receive the Prince and keep a close watch until I returned.
‘Where are you going?’
‘I want to look for my old friend Pentju.’
After some searching, I discovered the physician had decided to go to the Red Chapel at the Temple of Ptah to make an offering. I was intrigued. Pentju was like myself: he didn’t disbelieve in the Gods, he just didn’t bother them and hoped that they wouldn’t bother him. I collected a dagger from the House of War, together with a stout cudgel, and made my way up to the temple. For a while I became lost in the wretched slums, cobbled lanes nothing better than dark tunnels, which squeezed themselves past buildings. The squalor and dirt were a sharp contrast to the luxury and opulence of the palace. Flocks of crows and kites and packs of yellow pi-dogs scrabbled raucously, fighting with beak and claw over the heaps of filth where flies swarmed in dark clouds. I passed rickety doors, half opened to reveal stinking passageways, a place as dangerous as any war camp. I was glad to reach the basalt avenue leading down to the Temple of Ptah. I went through the monumental gates set between orange walls over which majestic lions of blue, yellow and red enamel mounted guard. A dense crowd clustered here: peasants in their short tunics, and elegant noblemen with their wives in perfumed robes. In the central courtyard a group of priests gathered before the soaring statue of Ptah, chanting their hymns and offering incense:
Lord, the countenance of the sky.
Thy shape is the god …
Once into the temple proper, moving through the smoky torchlight, I found a temple guard and introduced myself. He agreed to take me to the Scribe of Offerings, the priest who made a faithful record of all who visited the temple to pay their devotions. He led me across the precincts and through the courtyard where the executions and sacrifices had been made earlier in the day. The place still seethed with excitement; clouds of dust blowing like gold still hung heavy after the victory celebrations. We passed workshops, schools and granaries, and the house of the God’s handmaids. I was truly intrigued at why Pentju should come here. He had no devotion to Ptah and there were temples enough in Thebes to make offerings. At last we reached the Red Chapel, set amidst fertile lawns and fringed by palm groves. The Scribe of Offerings, bathing in the Pool of Purity, acknowledged Pentju had been there.
‘I remember him only too well.’ He climbed out of the pool, a servant hurrying forward to fold a robe about him. ‘Lord Pentju was most generous: a hundred ounos of silver for one of our mortuary priests.’
‘A priest of the dead?’ I queried. ‘For whom were the sacrifices to be made?’
‘For his wife and family slain in the City of the Aten.’
‘Slain?’
‘No, no.’ The old priest’s face crinkled up. ‘That was my mistake. No, died.’ He wiped beads of water from his face. ‘Ah, was it? Come with me.’
We entered the Red Chapel, an elegant building of quartzite stone, which glowed as if containing hidden fire, and into a tiled antechamber tastefully decorated with couches. An acacia-wood table stood in the centre, holding a gold-topped coffer. The priest opened this and took out the Book of Life for temple offerings. Pentju’s entry was the last. I noticed that the word khai-I, or slain, had been hurriedly crossed out and replaced with ‘died’. The entry also stipulated that the priest issue an execration text against a Child of Evil: ‘The Ur-sht, the Chief Slaughterer from the Aatiu, the slaughter house.’
‘Why should he do that?’ I asked.
The priest, who was only interested in profits, just sniffed.
‘Lord Pentju arrived here,’ he squeaked, ‘just before I bathed. I do so nine times every day. Well,’ he hurried on, glimpsing my impatience, ‘I brought him in here; he made the offering, but he seemed nervous, agitated. He explained how his wife and family had died of the pestilence in the Great Heretic’s city.’ The priest abruptly became fearful; fingers went to his lips. ‘My lord Mahu, I didn’t mean …’
‘I don’t care what you mean,’ I replied. ‘What did Lord Pentju say?’
‘I shouldn’t really be telling you this.’
I let my hand fall to the dagger beneath my robe and grasped my cudgel more tightly.
‘But you are a friend, my lord Mahu. There’s no real mystery. Lord Pentju asked for a priest to sing hymns and say prayers and curse the evil spirit who brought sickness to his family.’
‘And where did he go afterwards?’
‘He said he wanted to go to the House of Life. Our school of medicine is famous.’
I took directions from the priest and found Pentju in the Chamber of Salts and Potions at the temple House of Life. He was sitting behind the other scholars, listening to the physician describe how ripe almonds mixed with wormwood and sweet beer evacuate the belly. Most of his audience
were dozing. Pentju didn’t notice me. I stood and watched for a while. As a young man, Meryre’s friend and companion, Pentju had been arrogant, full of smug righteousness. The years had changed him: a long, lined face, furrows of anxiety around his eyes and mouth, ears slightly protuberant, his sharp eyes lost in some constant reverie, shoulders faintly hunched. He moved constantly as if in discomfort, clutching his belly or scratching his face. A nervous, agitated man, whose heart seemed to be grieving over something. I had seen the type before, or at least the mood. Men and women who live in a dream world as if constantly distracted by something they can’t share with anyone else. I had always considered Pentju eager to amass a fortune as well as win the reputation as a great physician. The City of the Aten had changed all that. He had lost his wife, family and kin. He had not been with them during the pestilence but had been protected in his own private mansion, having direct custody of Tutankhamun during his infant years. Why should Djoser babble about him before he died? Or Meryre make reference to him in his letters? During my journey down to Memphis I had studied every document, every sheet of papyrus and clay tablet seized in the usurper’s camp. Meryre often cited Pentju with the hope that the physician would join their cause, but despite all entreaties he had proved indifferent. While others, including Maya and Huy, had expressed an interest in rejecting the Aten cult but developing the City of the Aten as a place of importance along the Nile, Pentju’s reaction had been one of bored indifference.
The old lector priest giving the talk on diet and the effects of certain herbs on the belly and bowels finally drew his talk to an end. Pentju got to his feet and walked straight across to me.
‘Mahu, are you following me? I saw you arrive.’ His tired face eased into a smile. ‘But I thought the talk would do you more good than me.’
‘Why did you come to the Temple of Ptah?’ I asked.
‘Because their House of Life is famous. On reflection, its importance is much exaggerated.’ He rubbed his hands together. ‘I passed the execution wall. They clothed the red-haired woman in sheepskin cloth and hung her by her heels in chains. She did have,’ he added wistfully, ‘beautiful hair. It hangs down like a veil about her face. I stood there. I half closed my eyes, Mahu, and thought it was Nefertiti.’
‘You hated her that much?’
‘No.’
‘She hated you then?’
Pentju led me out of the chamber and into a high-walled courtyard with a small tile-edged, ornamental pool. A rather lonely place. I can recall the sunlight, the first coolness of the evening. Baskets of lupins stood around the pool. We sat down on a marble bench.
‘I always wondered, Mahu, when you’d come. You are a baboon, you know. You sit on your rock and watch.’
‘Nefertiti?’ I persisted.
‘Akenhaten’s wife.’ Pentju smiled. ‘His great Queen, Nefertiti!’
‘She hated you?’ I asked.
‘She hated me because of the Lady Khiya. You know how it happened, Mahu.’
‘Tell me again,’ I insisted.
‘Akenhaten built his city.’ Pentju sighed. ‘He was lost in his worship of Aten, the One. He suffered from delusions, believed he was the only one who could communicate directly with the All-Mighty, All-Seeing God, and then he moved a step higher. He believed that he was God’s son incarnate, and it’s only a small journey from there to believing that he was god himself. Nefertiti did not help. She offered her husband wine and drugs, the juice of the poppy, which disturbed his humours and forced him to live in a dream world. Some call him the Great Heretic, others a madman. He was just an idealist who became lost in drugged dreams. He was not the Chosen. He began to resent Nefertiti, the way she insisted on being his equal, and, of course, she never produced a son.’ Pentju leaned down and tapped one of the lupins with a finger. ‘Lady Khiya, Tutankhamun’s mother, was different.’ He kept his face hidden from me, but I caught the sob in his voice. ‘She was soft as a little mouse and would chatter to me. I discovered the red-haired bitch was feeding her potions and powders so she’d never conceive. I wanted to help the Lady Khiya.’
‘And have your revenge on Nefertiti, who had humiliated you?’
‘Yes, yes. She had.’ Pentju straightened up. ‘But it was Khiya I wanted to help. Akenhaten used to visit her; often about now, as the breeze cools, they’d go walking in the garden.’ He smiled. ‘Khiya became pregnant. At first Akenhaten was fearful of Nefertiti’s rage. For a short while, Mahu,’ Pentju stared at me, his eyes welling up, ‘Akenhaten was young again. You know the way he was. Like a young boy who’s stumbled on a clever idea. He was truly frightened that Nefertiti would damage either the Lady Khiya or the baby. He entrusted both of them to me and left secret instructions that if I should die,’ Pentju nudged me playfully, ‘you were to take responsibility.’ He shrugged. ‘Khiya died in childbirth. I looked after the boy walled up in that mansion, protected by mercenaries, then the plague struck, ravaging the City of the Aten as it did the rest of Egypt.’
‘Your wife and children died?’ I asked.
Pentju drew himself up, tightening his lips as if hiding some secret pain. ‘My wife, my boys, my girl, my brother and two other kinsmen all died in the last few days of the plague. By then Nefertiti had wormed her way back into Akenhaten’s affections, proclaiming herself joint ruler.’ Pentju scratched a spot on his hand. ‘Akenhaten came to visit me. He seemed fearful, suspicious. He told me that if anything happened to him he had left documents proclaiming you as the official custodian of his heir. The rest you know.’
‘The rest I don’t know, Pentju,’ I retorted. ‘A short while ago a battle was fought in the Delta which could have cost us all our lives. A usurper proclaimed himself Pharaoh because no one knows what did happen to Akenhaten.’
‘But neither do I. Oh, I have heard the stories that he may have been poisoned by Nefertiti, or even by his daughter, Meritaten; that his corpse lies hidden somewhere in the City of the Aten. I asked Meryre once when he invited me to dinner. Oh, he never talked treason but he hinted at it. One thing I did learn: Djoser and Khufu, the two priests? They did not leave with Akenhaten but afterwards; they may have taken his treasure. Did you find any trace of that?’
‘No, we didn’t.’ I edged closer. ‘But I found something more interesting. The False Pharaoh’s archives. They were very interesting, Pentju. Djoser, as he died, babbled about you knowing something.’
‘The mutterings of a traitor.’ Pentju became agitated. ‘But I did nothing wrong. I kept well away from Meryre’s scheming.’
‘I know you did,’ I soothed.
‘Well, they are all dead.’
‘Except Khufu,’ I murmured.
Pentju turned, face stricken, mouth slack. ‘Khufu!’ he whispered, then put his head in his hands and began to sob quietly.
Ari-Mehiu
(Ancient Egyptian for ‘the Keeper of the Drowned’)
Chapter 10
For a while Pentju could not control his agitation.
‘What is it?’ I asked. ‘Why are you so concerned that Khufu has survived?’
‘I couldn’t care if he burns in the Underworld, in the Pit of Eternal Fire.’ Pentju lifted his head. ‘I want this all brought to an end, Mahu. Egypt has its Prince.’
‘Why did you come to the Temple of Ptah?’ I asked.
Pentju wiped the tears with the back of his hand. ‘Am I under arrest, Mahu? Will I be summoned to the Court of Amun or be made to answer to the Royal Circle? Has the Lord Ay gathered his policemen?’
‘No.’ I stretched out my legs and forced myself to relax. ‘I am here because I am Mahu, Child of the Kap, and so are you.’
‘When did you care for anyone, Mahu, apart from your hunting, your poetry and that servant of yours, Djarka?’ Pentju leaned over, plucked a flower and sniffed at it before tossing it into the pool. ‘And that’s wrong too,’ he apologised. ‘You do care for the Prince; that’s why I’ll answer your questions, or try to.’
‘Let me help you, Pentju. You
came to the Temple of Ptah to make offerings to pay a mortuary priest, because it is far away from Thebes and the inquisitive eyes of the Lord Ay and his gang.’
Pentju didn’t protest.
‘What I want to know is why you described your family as slain. Why you paid for an execration text for a Child of Evil to be cursed.’
‘I regard my family as murdered, Mahu. I should have looked after them. I was the physician. I should have done something, but I was guarding the Prince. I brought them to the City of the Aten: that’s the Child of Evil; that’s also what I called the plague.’
His answers were too easy, bland, the words came tripping off his tongue, so I knew it would be futile to press the matter further. He got to his feet.
‘So, you have Khufu?’ He stretched out his hand and grasped mine. ‘He may be interesting. You should keep him safe.’
Pentju left. I returned to the emptying streets. The celebrations were now finished. In the squares some temple girls still lingered, watching a conjuror breathe fire from his mouth whilst two dwarfs performed lacklustre somersaults. Beggars clustered like locusts, eager to test the generosity of those going to and from the wine shops and temple booths. Market police, cudgels in hand, kept a wary eye on the throng of soldiers and mercenaries drifting into the town as their officers relaxed discipline at the barracks. A balmy evening, one I will always remember after the stench of the Delta; the homely smells of cooking shops, cheap perfume, as well as the smoke from burning tamarind seed and incense, came as a welcome relief. I passed the slaughter house near the Wall of Death and glimpsed the cadavers of the red-haired woman and the mercenary captains who had supported her, bound in sheepskin, hanging by their heels in chains.
I kept away from the slums. The hour was too late, and even my club and dagger might not be protection enough. I walked up the main avenue, dominated on either side by its line of copper-headed bulls. People of every nation streamed by, chattering in various tongues: striped-robed sand-dwellers, Libyan shepherds, merchants from Punt and Kush. Whenever an army assembles, the traders always follow. Heralds armed with conch horns were still proclaiming Horemheb’s great victory in the Delta. Already the storytellers were busy for custom, offering to provide their audience with graphic and truthful accounts of ‘the hideous struggle against the usurper’. Some enterprising trader claimed he had red hair plucked from the false Pharaoh’s Queen, and offered to sell it as a memento to any interested passer-by. I walked through them swinging my cudgel, lost in my own thoughts. A boy came alongside me. He was jumping up and down like a frog, something glittering in his hand. I smiled and walked faster; so did he, a fixed smile on his face.